Checkmate
by AxOforever
Summary: Fist closed tight around the tags, Sherlock fumbled for the note which had fluttered to the floor upon his haste to open the letter. An unknown fear gripped him as he read the short, terrifying sentence: Lost something?-Moriarty XXX Post-Reichenbach. During the three years he was gone, Sherlock took something of Moriarty's. Something important. It's only fair to return the favor.
1. Chapter 1

Sherlock sat hunched over the microscope on the kitchen table, intermittently checking the chemical solution to his right dissolving at a snail's pace and pouring over his notes. The seemingly endless rush of murders, all connected in some unfathomable way, making for a very interesting case, were running him ragged. That measly apple exactly forty-three hours and seventeen minutes ago, coupled with the restless two and a half hours of sleep yesterday were doing nothing to help his situation. His mind raced; he'd figured out the connection between each death so far, and judging by the frequency with which the murderer struck and the last victim, there was little time left. Mycroft had tried to offer his help but the detective told him to frankly keep his fat nose out of it. Now, if only he could just figure out the composition of the sample taken earlier…

The detective called for John to bring him his laptop, repeating the action when there was no reply before remembering that John had gone out with that new girlfriend of his earlier…Layne or Lois or Laura or whatever her name was. Briefly, Sherlock entertained the thought of getting up and retrieving the laptop himself, then decided against it. He would just have to find the information in his mind palace somewhere.

Truth be told, this case was frightening him. All of the murders had been exactly linked to _him_. It had started with the granddaughter of Sherlock's mother's midwife found strangled in the peds ward of a hospital. Then his childhood nanny's nephew was beaten to death in the stables of Sherrinford estate, where he and Mycroft grew up. It continued; an old primary school bully turned up on the shore of the Thames; the girl Sherlock's parents had betrothed him to at age fifteen (whose own parents had been scared off by their future son-in-law long before either of them came of age)stabbed in a chapel; the professor who'd taught him chemistry for his entire education at Uni died of severe chemical burns. Eventually, it had dawned on the detective that the murderer was killing off people related to events in his life in chronological order. Sherlock's suspicions were proven right when a drug dealer (who he may or may not have had contact with in the past) was forcibly overdosed, a cabbie shot, a Chinese acrobat impaled, a young boy drowned, a prostitute beheaded, a dog trainer ripped apart and an actor pushed from a building all turned up within a week, following some of his most notable cases. All of the bodies were branded with a symbol. It was hard to make out, but by the looks of it, the mark appeared to be some sort of bird. Since his return, Sherlock had kept a mostly low profile, and the trail of murders had gone cold. They were caught up to his life in the present. Sherlock feared the next death would be someone he'd rather have alive.

Memories of tracking down the assassins hired to kill Mrs. Hudson, Lestrade and John invadid his otherwise preoccupied mind, but the detective quickly locked them in the rubbish section of his mind. If they had been anything but relevant to Moriarty's web of lies or the case at hand, they would have been long since deleted.

Sherlock turned his focus back to the task at hand. Using the zoom on the microscope, he could see the genetic makeup of the crumbly substance found scattered over the actor's body. By the looks of it, the crumbs were common, non-lethal or explosive items. Very dry. Smelled odd. There were few materials that it could have been; dried dirt, bark, breadcrumbs, sand, preserved droppings of the Guatemalan flying…

_Breadcrumbs. _

Something clicked. Sherlock excitedly dashed to the other room, nearly colliding with John's chair on his way to the bookcase. Skimming quickly through the titles, he found the one he was looking for crammed between his _Database Issues in Geographic Information Systems _and John's copy of _1984. _The book in his hands proclaimed the title _Grimm's Fairy Tales _in bold black print, surrounded by colorful decorations of little children playing on vines or whatever nonsense happened in those stories. Sherlock flipped open to the inside cover and grinned; the mark branded on the victims' bodies stared back at him in blood-red ink. It was a magpie, with a bit of treasure wedged in its beak. The same as…

Downstairs, the door to 221A opened, presumably to fetch the post which had just arrived about twenty-three minutes ago. Mrs. Hudson's pointy shoes clicked against the tile flooring as she sorted through bills on her way back to her flat, and Sherlock would have paid her no mind had her footsteps not stopped in front of the stairs.

"Post here for you, Sherlock!" His landlady called up, "Nice letter by the looks of it, haven't seen a real wax stamp in ages."

That caught his attention. With a lightning pace, his mind sorted through the myriad of details revealed in the past two minutes.

_Breadcrumbs._

_Magpie._

_Wax seal. _

Moriarty.

Sherlock had never made it down those seventeen steps fasted in his life, startling Mrs. Hudson as he seized the envelope out of her hands. Just as he'd suspected; Bohemian. A note inside, small, crisp paper. There was a heavy weight too, and by the feel and sound of metal clicking, he'd assume it was a necklace of some sort. The detective barely made it back to his flat before ripping open the envelope with no second thoughts and poured the contents into his palm.

His blood ran cold.

Two circular, military-issued ID tags rested in his hand, already-warm metal weighing so much more in his head than it actually did. Unconsciously, Sherlock's thumb traced the distended metal lettering he had memorized ages ago. _A POS, 28498373, WATSON, JH, M._ It wasn't considered normal for John to wear his dog tags when he went out, but on particularly bad days—when memories and nightmares from his army days became a bit too much to handle—his flat mate could be seen slipping the two small disks underneath his baggy jumper. He and Sherlock had running joke that he should wear them out on cases, in the event that he was found by one of the murderers and could be identified easily when his body eventually turned up.

Fist closed tight around the tags, Sherlock fumbled for the note which had fluttered to the floor upon his haste to open the letter. An unknown fear gripped him as he read the short, terrifying sentence:

_Lost something?_

_-Moriarty XXX_

**I know, I know, I already started this and then deleted it, but that version just wasn't working for me. Here's the new version! :D Yay! Tell me what you think! Comments and criticisms are very appreciated.**


	2. Chapter 2

_John's missing_—_SH_.

_We've discussed this, Sherlock. Every time Dr. Watson leaves your line of sight, it is not a valid reason to inform me of it—Mycroft._

_Moriarty has him—SH._

The response was instantaneous.

_Are you certain?—Mycroft._

_Would I come to you if I wasn't?—SH. _Then, to prove his conviction to his brother, Sherlock snapped a photograph of John's dog tags and the note and sent it. His phone buzzed a moment later.

_I'm sending a car now—Mycroft._

Cursing himself for how stupid he had been, Sherlock snatched his customary blue scarf from the back of his chair and ripped his coat from the hook on the door, nearly taking it off its hinges. Of course he should have foreseen this; the obsession with his life, the obvious mark of power on the victims, the game-like quality of the case. Moriarty was back, and John was gone because Sherlock had downgraded the threat his enemy posed.

It had been three years since the detective had last seen or heard from Jim Moriarty, busying himself with destroying the remnants of his web of crime, tracking down leads and removing the threat. Since the doppelganger on the roof shot himself in the head, Sherlock had been quite certain of the fact that James Moriarty was, in fact, dead. Up until breaking into one of the top-secret bases, where the truth about Moriarty and the man whose name actually was Richard Brookes and who'd undergone reconstructive surgery a few months back to look like his boss—for what reason other than money, Sherlock would never understand _why _the _bloody hell _he would do that—had been revealed. The truth, that Moriarty was indeed alive and kicking, had been enough to cancel his three-year-mission and return to London.

Scrolling through the older messages on his phone, Sherlock came to the blocked number tagged with the message, _Come and play. Tower Hill. Jim Moriarty x_. Firing off a text reading _What do you want?,_ the world's only consulting detective crashed heavily on the couch to wait for the car Mycroft sent, head in his hands as he sorted the facts. Fact: John left around ten to twelve this morning for a brunch date with Lydia/Lindsey/Lina. Fact: He'd left his mobile at the flat, meaning he wasn't expecting to be gone very long. Fact: John took his heavier coat, so the restaurant shouldn't have been far if he walked. Fact: Sometime between leaving the flat and now, his friend had been abducted by his archenemy and was presumably being held and tortured somewhere the police would never find him. The situation would have made for a very interesting case had his stomach not twisted itself into multiple knots. Sherlock knew very well what Moriarty was capable of. If they didn't get to John soon…

No. He would not allow his mind to wander that far. John's life depended on his brain being cleared of any rubbish that wasn't useful.

A sleek black car pulled up beside the kerb on Baker Street. For the second time that day, Sherlock sprinted down the steps like a madman and called for Mrs. Hudson to not leave the flat under any circumstances and to lock all the doors and windows before throwing open the passenger door and hurling himself inside. To his surprise, Mycroft sat there across from him instead of his assistant, a grave expression on his face, customary umbrella clenched in his hands. Mycroft turned his head and murmured to the driver—Sherlock caught the words "Scotland Yard"—before turning back to his brother as the car sped off. The Holmes brothers stared silently at each other, an unspoken communication flowing between them.

"I have people sifting through the CCTV feeds now," Mycroft began, "If there is any surveillance footage of John's kidnapping, we'll find it."

Sherlock nodded, not quite hearing his brother's words as the familiar settings of London passed by. So absorbed in the hazardously fascinating case had he been that the detective hadn't noticed when exactly John had left, nor that his flat mate hadn't come home, although that could have been because the date went very well indeed. Now, nearly twenty-four hours later, five of them being after the arrival of the post, Sherlock's last option was his brother. Nothing on the envelope suggested where his flat mate was being held. He'd run tests on the tags, the crumbs, the paper of the note, but nothing yielded any helpful information. There wasn't a sliver of data to go on. For once, Sherlock was baffled. How could a man be kidnapped in the middle of a bright, sunlight day? Surely _one_ of the 8.174 million inhabitants of London must have thought something was off. And John…John wouldn't have gone without a fight, he didn't have his gun but he could pack quite a punch. _Someone _had to notice _that_. Unless, of course, Moriarty threatened him with the death of an innocent. John would have gone quietly if it meant saving someone else—damn the man's morals.

Warmth bloomed on his knee. Sherlock turned his attention from the window to find, with mild shock, Mycroft's hand resting there, a gesture that was both awkward and grounding at the same time. "We _will_ find him, Sherlock," said Mycroft softly, in a tone he hadn't used since they were small. Both the touch and the words were probably the closest from of affection either brother had received or given in a long while. Possibly even the closest form of affection, period. Sherlock managed a minute smile for his brother, more of a grimace, really, but it was a start; when the British Government himself offered comfort, albeit in a small, mechanical motion, one had to accept.

The car slowed to a stop. Scotland Yard loomed ahead, yet Mycroft stayed put when Sherlock stood to leave.

"Aren't you coming?" He knew the answer already; the question was just a formality. Even when his brother's best—and only—friend was conceivably moments away from death, it took a backseat to the oh-so important world of politics.

Mycroft sighed heavily, tapping the umbrella against the floor. "Unfortunately, I have more pressing matters to attend to at the moment," he grimaced, as if it pained him, "But if the situation becomes dire, I will be available if needed."

Sherlock nodded tightly and made to close the door, but the umbrella caught before it shut. "And Sherlock…do not do anything without thinking first."

"I haven't the faintest idea what you mean, dear brother."

**Wow, I didn't expect this much positive feedback from the last chapter! :) It's inspired me to churn out a new one, sooner than I thought I'd have it done. Thank you all! Comments, criticisms, ideas, challenges, suggestions, and anything you want to see/think will happen is always welcome! Review or PM me any of those if you have them. Next chapter soon!**

**AN: I just HAD to put some Mycroft/Sherlock bonding in there. I just imagine them closer than they really are, but I dialed it down for the sake of plot and canon. Hope you liked it! **


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